Saturday, April 23, 2011

As we have 4 kits now progressing through the Family Tree DNA Y-DNA67 to Y-DNA111 upgrade to see what these new markers tell us about our closest matches, it was time to add placeholders for them on the results summary page.
Judicious use of your browser's zoom capabilities may be called for.

A pedigree for the family of John & Alice/Alison (AINSLIE) FAIRBAIRN has been included in the "lineages" on the One Name Study pages.
John is one of the two contemporary Johns buried at Swinton (Berwickshire, Scotland) within months of each other.
The other, John (married to Helen CAMPBELL) is already represented in the DNA Project, and a representative for John and Alice's family is still sought, for which purpose, a DNA oriented outline pedigree has also been included on the Summary DNA Patriarch Page

Tuesday, April 19, 2011

Nearly gave up on finding James and Christian (SCOTT) FAIRBAIRN in the 1841 census.
Eventually found in Kelso on FreeCen by searching for the children, but ancestry was a different matter.
Didn't help that they were recorded as GAVIBAIN and GOURBAIN (in the same household), with James enumerated as 30, when he was actually 42, and Christian as 27, instead of the 30 her actual age of 34 should have shown her as, and Alison/Alice was Eleson 4 instead of 7; Elizabeth 8 instead of 11, John 6 instead of 8.
This is the family of John & Alice or Alison (AINSLIE) FAIRBAIRN, one of the two John FAIRBAIRNs of an age in Swinton (BEW)

So today's inventive indexing entries are the above GAVIBAIN and GOURBAIN, with an unrelated FAIOBAM.

Saturday, April 16, 2011

A strong contender for the weirdest transcription error of FAIRBAIRN may just have been found:
SEAWBRASE
The family was resisting being found in 1841 (on ancestry - they are in plain view as FAIRBAIRN on FreeCen), apart from son Thomas, who was with his grandparents Shepherd & Isabella ROBERTSON. A firstname search took a couple of scans to figure out the SEAWBRASE family was likely to be worthy of a further look.
Anyone researching the family of Alexander & Anne (ROBERTSON) FAIRBAIRN?
Married 1808 Anstruther Wester, Fife, Scotland.

Friday, April 15, 2011

If interested in dipping your toe into the water of DNA testing and seeing where it might lead, or interested in upgrading to a higher number of markers for better result matching, today is the day.

Family Tree DNA are having a DNA Day, whereby selected tests are discounted.
Check out their facebook page for futher details - coupon code DNADAY2011, which will expire on Friday at midnight (USA CT).

They have also announced that the introductory price for the upgrade from Y-DNA67 to Y-DNA111 will end with the above promotion.
This latter upgrade is of particular interest to those with exact, or very close, matches at the Y-DNA67 level - several of whom will have been contacted directly (by the Project Administrator).

Friday, April 8, 2011

Family Tree DNA have announced a new Y-DNA111 test, which adds, as you can tell, a further 44 markers to their Y-DNA67 test.
As such it will be of particular interest to those with close/exact matches at the Y-DNA67 level.
Read about it here, remembering that discounts apply to tests ordered via the project.
To order, log into your personal page with Family Tree DNA
select Order Tests and Upgrades
then under Order Standard Tests, select Go to Standard Orders
From which latter, select the Y-DNA111 upgrade for the project discounted price.

Obviously, the benefit of comparisons of the extra markers will take some time to build up.

Of our tests, it would appear that the following may benefit more than most from this upgrade (from our result summary page):
From Lineage 1 "clump 1": Earl (F-2) and G Roy (F-3); Doug (F-14) and Michael (F-16)
From "clump 2": John (F-17), Robert F (F-34), Stewart (F-38), ie those nearest the modal; and the Eckford (F-27) and Geoffrey (F-39), our latest 67/67 match, which includes the line of the mysterious Robert of Eckford.

Should anyone wish to help fund these upgrades for the additional information we will gain, please contribute here, making sure that the FAIRBURN project has been selected.

Saturday, April 2, 2011

A brief outline of the family of James & Ann (WALKER) FAIRBAIRN has been added to the Patriarchs page.
We would love to prove they are the parents of Robert, married to Catherine STEWART.
James was born Eccles, Berwickshire, and by 1841 was a ploughman in Galashiels, Selkirkshire, but by 1851 had become a grocer and draper, his 1866 death cert. giving his father (forename unknown) as a tailor and clothier, and mother as an Isabella (surname unknown).
Robert may, or may not, have died in Australia.

While researching this I happened upon an interesting conundrum on the aging effect of sea air, the Alexander mentioned being a grandson of the above.